Slashdot Mirror
Are Video Game Patents Next?
MarcOiL writes "Gamasutra is running an article titled It's Just a Game, Right? Top Mythconceptions on Patent Protection of Video Games where two IP lawyers try to convince the videogame industry of patenting everything in sight: ideas, technical contributions, etc. They show as an example a Microsoft patent on Scoring based upon goals achieved and subjective elements. They also have created a weblog, The Patent Arcade, to promote their business. Will this be the real end of innovation in videogames?"
"where two IP lawyers try to convince the videogame industry of patenting everything in sight: ideas, technical contributions, etc. "
Q. What do you have when you have 2 lawyers buried up to their necks in cement?
A. Not enough cement.
I thought I remembered seeing a Slashdot story or post about Namco holding a patent on "displaying a mini-game while the actual game is loading" not too long ago.
Video gaming is a huge industry, bigger than music, bigger than movies, bigger than cellphones.
Freaking huge. Gigantic. Teens, young adults, adults dumping - THROWING - disposable income at the latest, the greatest, the trendy, the hip, the best.
It's too big for the major players to f*$@ up. If a minor player tries to get these patent stuff racheted up the big boys will crush them - and crush them fast and/or acquire them.
Patenting filming techniques? Writing styles? Facial expressions?
I would imagine any D&D would be prior art in a general games category? MSoft wasn't exactly the first company to get into games. I'm not sure how they can get a pantent on how points are awarded. Any D&D DM has subjective power to award points, and MS didn't exactly put D&D out there.
I have never let my schooling interfere with my education.
Our informal review of the records at the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office (PTO) revealed a relative dearth of patent applications for the film industry, especially considering how technology-dependent the film industry is, and given its size in terms of annual sales. Why is that? Patents, by their very nature, grant the right to exclude your competitors from stealing the fruits of your labor, and yet this powerful tool appears to be overlooked by the majority of the industry.
So, who will be the first to patent the three act structure, the mismatched buddy pairing and so on? Just think how much money EON would have made if they'd only had the sense to patent Spy movies with fancy gadgets?
"I Know You Are But What Am I?"
Will this be the real end of innovation in videogames?"
Yes.
Wow that was an easy Ask Slashdot!
"And then I visited Wikipedia
Note: I don't agree with software or videogame patents, because I think they screw the consumer in the end by providing a crappy product, at likely a high price. But still, that last sentence made no sense.
They show as an example a Microsoft patent on Scoring based upon goals achieved and subjective elements.
In other news all sports leagues must pay a royalty to M$ in order for the score to be kept. Opponents of licensing Microsofts innovative idea of "earning points in a competition" contend "it's not whether you win or lose, it's how you play the game."
None of this can possibly be patentable!
can it?
for instance, lighting, different weapons, weapons with 2 modes, reloading animations, running animations, reflections in water/mirrors/shiny things, monster AI, physics engine, shaders, control layout?!?
What would be patentable?
Check journal for info on Anti-TextBook, an idea by me.
software patents such as most of /., i do think this is a totally bad idea (and i don't see how it would go through)
I think this more than anything would really stiffle innovation. the whole gaming industry moves so fast that it wouldn't seem worth it to waste money on patents. you would think they would want to crank out the next product to garner more earnings than sit on one idea for to long.
but then again, that is logical
Patents are provided to people of the United States (and other countries) to hold a 'temporary monopoly' on a product or idea. They are used to encourage developers to create things without their ideas being stolen. This enhances the level of development in the country as a whole, and is good for our economy and society.
However, video games don't give back the same benefits as say, food, energy and transportation. A fellow programmer once said to me "What if someone had a patent on the First Person Shooter?" Imagine how dead development would be in the video game genre!
Sigs are for Terrorists.
My guess: the game industry decided not to claim any patents and let every game company earn some money. :-(.
Now the lawyers want some money too
Stefano
Patents are a bad thing. I fully agree with John Carmack on that and I applaud him for releasing all his engines for free.
Disclaimer: Software patents are bad and stupid.
However...
I suspect that an increase in patents on game software features might promote innovation in games, since it might be harder to just spit out yet another first-person shooter without getting sued.
I am going to go out and get a patent for plumbers jumping on mushroom people. That would be the best idea ever.
/. ++
Nintendo Patents use of the words Mario, Luigi, Link, Princess and the use of a directional pad or joystick on a controller.
How screwed up the industry would be.
Thunderclone: ONE MAN ENTERS! TWO MEN LEAVE! ONE MAN ENTERS! TWO MEN LEAVE!
Is it just me, or does that patent seem to apply to Project Gotham Racing? What is interesting is that the game was only published by MS, but was developed by Bizzare Creations. And there are similar elements in Fable.
Remember the Alamo, and God Bless Texas...
It would greatly reduce innovation. It's just lawyers trying to drum up business though, so we don't need to worry yet.
Signed,
Human Capacity for Lameness is Apparently Inexhaustible, Esq.
It could be a good thing, too. Maybe this way we wont have 50 incarnations of the same goddamn game like we do now.
I REALLY hope not
application I've, just this morning been reading the USPTO's 'consolidated patent rules. [PDF document].
Thought it might interest folks discussing parent subject matter WRT USA patents.
The french association of Game Producer (APOM) has already taken position against software patents in an open letter to the former French Minister.
:
Here's a slightly improved Google translation for the french impaired
Position of the APOM on directive COM(2002)092 relating to the patentability of the "inventions implemented by computer"
Mister the Prime Minister,
The APOM is the French association of producers of multi-media works. It gathers 80 percent of the French producers of video games, an industry which employs many designers, programmers, and creators of high level whose competence is internationally recognized. The APOM is very worried by the current proposal for a European directive on the "inventions implemented by computer", more commonly called "directive on software patentability ". After careful reading, it appears to us that the initial text proposed by the Commission [ 1 ], as well as the version resulting from the working group on the intellectual property of the Council [ 2 ], would be extremely detrimental to our industry.
Indeed, the major part of the process of creation of multi-media works, such as for example video games, consists in developping and processing, in a single and original way, a combination of simple elementary ideas.
To authorize the privatisation of these elementary ideas, as the texts of the Commission and the Council allow, would not have any inciting effect on innovation and creation, but instead, would put every developper under the threat of possible attacks in counterfeit of such software patents. In the United States already, the toxicity of software patents on the innovation and SME innovation are more and more recognized [ 3 ], and were the subject of a report of the Federal Trade Commission [ 4 ]. Bill Gates himself recognized explicitly that software patents are harmful to innovation, and that they are a monopolistic weapon that Microsoft must exploit in order to preserve its dominant position [ 5 ].
Legalization by Europe of software patents would have the same noxious effect, and would put European SME under the threat of the software patents already granted in great number by the European Patent Office to large non-European companies, for the moment fortunately invalid in front of the courts, such as a patent on the "progression bar" [ 6 ], used in almost all the software, or the patent on the breeding and the control of virtual creatures [ 7 ]. These patents and of others, granted by the OEB in spite of their manifest absence of technical nature, illustrate clearly that it is impossible to make a conceptual distinction between "technical" and "non-technical" software, and that any allegedly restrictive legalization of the brevetage of intellectual methods will inevitably lead to total software patentability, which constitutes a serious threat for multi-media and software creation.
The APOM considers that copyright/right of author, supplemented by the rights on models and trademarks, is amply sufficient to protect works multi-media. These rights make it possible to protect the creators against infringment, while not putting legal hurdles to the creation of new works.
The APOM is thus very satisfied with the form of the directive voted by the European Parliament, which, by limiting the patentable subject-matter to the sole innovations having a material effect, wether they make use of a computer or not, prevents in effect the appropriation of intellectual methods, the building blocks of software creation. The APOM is also pleased with the parliamentary amendments relating to interoperability, which prevent the creation of abusive monopolies on data formats and the communications protocols necessary to the handling of sounds and images such as in network games.
The APOM considers that, within the framework of the support plan for the creators of video games, as decided by Mr. the Prime Minister, it is essential that the French government guarantees
That just goes to show you when lawyer's get involved, the shit is going to hit the fan, mostly because in the end it's not about their clients, but their own pocketbook that will benefit. See any class action lawsuit where they get the bulk of the money to "distribute" the winnings of the case.
Incidently, I heard over 95% of congress being laywers.....
Imagine if the original LineTo algorithm got patented or if id software patented everything they did, we'd still be darkages in terms of graphics.
"If I have seen further [than certain other men] it is by standing upon the shoulders of giants." -Newton
Can you patent plot elements in books?
xkcd.com - a webcomic of mathematics, love, and language.
I saw that on slashdot last week with 'A Gamers' Manifesto'
From the essay:Yes, innovation will suffer because the smaller shareware/freeware/demoware players will be fed up with the whole patent business and go raise goats or something ... while the big players trade patents with one another to make the same three games they've made for the past ten years. The big boys won't even have the little guys to copy ideas from! EA, Sony, and Microsoft are no doubt salivating at the thought of complete idea-monopoly of whatever the next big genre is (MMOFPSRPGRTSSimChess?).
You are in a maze of twisty little legal passages, all alike.
It's supposed to be completely automatic, but actually you have to press this button.
Trivia question: what was the first arcade game to feature a "punch" button?
How about the first solid-object polygon game? How many years before the 2nd one?
No, you'll just have one company making 50 incarnations of the same goddamn game, and no motivation to change that.
"Plans are for fools! Oglethorpe, the plutonian (Aqua Teen Hunger Force)
That patent can probably be killed with prior art. The Commodore 64 had "Mix-E-Load" during loading of the cassette version of Thalamus' Delta in 1987. This had music playing and would let you mess with the tracks, changing the bass line, drum beat, etc. and letting you mix your own music.
A year later, in 1988, the Mastertronic game Kane 2 had a Space Invaders game (called Invade-A-Load) that you played while the main game was loading. Again, this was on the cassette version.
These can be played by downloading the relevant .TAP files and loading them into an emulator such as x64.
Anyway, back on-topic, most of the classic games in existence would not be with us had game companies been patenting stuff like these mutants are suggesting.
Lets face it - Patent holders, as technical intellectual property creators, have been falling behind the protections afforded to their artistic bretheren! Copyright holders now have an entire century to reap the benfits, adn for their offspring to reap the benefits, of their labors. It seems wholely unfair to limit patents to such short terms as 14 years (20 for non-design).
I believe patents should be perpetual. Once you create it it should be your forever! And you children and your childrens children. We have seen my the slow - nay, slowing pace (based on patents per dollar spent on healthcare)- of patent applications and inventions in the 20th century that patent protection does not provide the needed impetus for our truly creative technical experts to advance the sciences.
There are numerous cases of inventors who could have changed the world, but insted of licencing their technology, compaies just waited until the patents ran out, and the used those iventions with no compensation to the creative mind whatsoever.
This must stop. We all must rise up and demand perpetual patents now.
(aren't you glad there isn't a _really_ organized lobby for patent holders like there is for performance artists?)
Is it just my observation, or are there way too many stupid people in the world?
I hope Duke Nukem Forever makes it before that!
This is my sig. There are thousands more, but this one is mine.
Actually realising a company has an patentable idea is an expensive proposition. Last time I worked for a company that had a patent policy, any new ideas were run past their legal team. Full time legal teams are not cheap. A multinational microchip company can afford them but games studios are a lot smaller. Programmers have to be taken off their project, it all adds up.
Most compnaies will remove an idea if it turns out its patented. It's clearly no longer going to be a major feature since it's been done before. usually there's another way to do this.
Alternatively they might not realise they have infringed your patent. If you charge them enough to justify the cost of getting the patent in the first place, they're quite likely to fold. Games companies do this a lot.
I suspect that this will work a lot better for the larger publishers. But really it seems like more of a way to push out smaller players.
The gaming industry knows that this will only kill them off. They have had a taste of it in the controler market already and really didn't like it. True frce feedback was pretty much killed off because of this. They also know that patents on games will kill their chances of getting people to play a new genere of games (if and when that happens) as many people do not like the steep learning curves that different generes produce and will simply not purchase a game...
We were all warned a long time ago that MS products sucked, remember the Magic 8 Ball said, "Outlook not so good"
Use BugMeNot http://www.bugmenot.com/
God: An invisible friend for grown-ups.
I hope EA doesn't read this. Probably too late already.
What do you call a hundred dead lawyers at the bottom of the ocean?
A good start.
"When viewing images, tab icons now display thumbnails of the displayed image."
;)
I bet someone's mom/wife suggested this feature...
.: Max Romantschuk
Will this mean you can patent elements of films - such as (assuming you had prior art) the 24 'spit screens' view, or the fade/dissolve, or perhaps subtitles, the count-down bomb-timer that stops at 1 second, the use of camera shake in a war film, the idea of sequels and prequels, books-to-films, the screen kiss!? Whats next? perhaps you could patent the use of light and shadow in paintings?
This comment does not represent the views or opinions of the user.
If we want to avoid "obvious" patents, then we need to educate the patent examiners so they understand the state of the art. Obvious ideas and ones clearly found in other's prior art should not get patents, but it is up to the examiner to decide that. Perhaps someone will create a database of prior art and historical innovations that patent examiners can use to weed out the bad patents.
If an idea is not in the prior art and a couple of geeks can't quickly imagine/document the idea for the database, then perhaps it is worthy of a patent.
Two wrongs don't make a right, but three lefts do.
What do you mean "next"? They're already here.
Patent 1
Patent 2
Patent 3
But this "patent everything" is getting out of hand, and guess who will be the one to suffer? The patient applicants. Why? I'll tell you why: Because of all the stupid patents claims, people will lose respect for the patent process. Just wait until some random country (Ch*cough*ina) has the engineering knowledge to duplicate whatever patent they want, do they think they will think twice, especially since they can just shrug off any arguments, by pointing at those stupid patents? I think not.
Why should someone be able to patent something in a videogame? This is just a majorly dumb idea, patenting media. Why doesn't someone just patent podcasting and be done with the whole industry??
Join moola.com, play games to earn money.
Maybe then when my seven-month old daughter is old enough for those game-addict genes she got from her dad to kick in, the video games will be so lame that she'll read a book instead.
Will this be the real end of innovation in videogames?
I didn't realize we still had innovation. I thought we had three or four basic games with improving graphics, different controls and the same generic UI. Don't get me wrong, I really enjoy a lot of the games out there nowadays. But I haven't seen something real innovative in a while.
"It is a miracle that curiosity survives formal education." -Albert Einstein
It is already happening in small form. Back when the human genome project was still news there were pharma companies patening specific genetic sequences (sorry, I don't know the specific bio term). They had little to no knowledge of what the sequences were responsible for, but they were patenting them on the hopes that it was something big. They were playing a patent lottery and it was causing a flood of work for the patent office.
Or do they mean EA moneymilking "The Sims"?
Moreover, since large companies like EA took over, innovation is hard to find without a magnifying glass. It's easier to "sell the same stuff that sold great last time" then to make a totally new game. Or to make a new game based on proven concepts like RTS or FPS. Or they produce some monster based on a popular movie (Harry Potter, LOTR) just to cash in some easy money based on the license they bought
Don't get me wrong, I am dying to get Battlefield 2. And it sure will have some great new feats. But saying a game like HL2 is totally innovative for the industry is wrong in my perception. It's got some nice worked-out features - the buggy, the hovercraft, the source engine, the physics engine - but nothing totally new or even "original" (or perhaps the gravity gun).
imho innovation died the day Peter Molyneux decided to leave Bullfrog. They made some really innovative games like Theme Hospital, Theme Park, Dungeon Kepper,...
From the linked Microsoft patent:
"Subjective style points are awarded if the player performs feats of style that are not necessary tasks of the game, depend upon the type of game, and may include sliding, spinning, jumping, blocking an opponent, passing an opponent, and avoiding obstacles."
I'm pretty sure the first Tony Hawk game came out before 2003. Of course there were probably plenty of other games before that, but I don't feel like researching or remembering them
However, unlike oppurtunistic, quick buck, cocksmokers (these guys) they actually produce products and have an interest in continuing to do so. Polluting a creative industry with patent battles would hurt everyone involved.
The TV and Movie industries are desperate to get the 12 to 24 year old males back in front of their crap. Killing game innovation could be just the ticket.
I felt like retching. What a despicable attitude the authors of the article have.
Basically they say: true, patents for game developers are useless, evil, and costly, but pay us to get them for you, because your competitor may do so too and you won't be able to defend yourself if you don't have patents of your own.
I almost felt ill when I read how they encouraged game developers to patent even VERY small changes to existing game concepts. What a great way to stop innovation in games!
And, of course, nobody says that game devlopers are the only ones to patent game designs. In fact, I think it is even easier to come up with game ideas when you don't have to think of how to implement them.
So, what are we still lacking now in games now...
One. Battles between armies with hundreds of thousands of individually controlled units! Let's patent that! The technology will be here in a few years, and having a patent at the time will effectively stop any game developer from building this into a game!
Two. Brain-controlled game characters. Instead of controlling a character with a mouse, you just think about what your character needs to do, and it will do it. Can't do that now, maybe can't do that within twenty years, but at least we will go some steps away from mouse and joystick towards more direct interfacing, so with a proper "and any reminiscent techniques not explicitly mentioned in this patent", we will go a long way in cashing on new interfaces too.
Three. A computer-controlled character you can have an actual relationship with. Yes, I know, AI is not far enough yet, but it will come more quickly than most people expect.
And I could go on like this...
I was almost going to say "Too bad I live in Europe"...
Strategic Simulations Incorporated's Unlimited Adventures game.
It was a very old-school C64, early IBM PC game that took place in the AD&D World of the Forgotten Realms, where players would go through the provided adventure and then craft their own adventures to share with their friends.
This second part of the game, creating adventures to share with friends, includes making set goals and awarding XP based upon the achievement of those goals. Oh and it also takes place all on an electronic device...
This was in the mid to early 80's.
If that isn't prior art, I honestly have no idea what is.
If you ignore the other uses of a tool, does that make the tool less useful, or you less useful?
"... However, the practice is unknown to the fluff pulp community. ..."
More proof, if any were needed, that the world truly has gone mad.
God: An invisible friend for grown-ups.
>Will this be the real end of innovation in videogames?
Well, for that to happen there should be some innovation to start with. Paradoxically, software patent could actually enforce some goddamn innovation in games, by preventing game developers from ripping each other off continuosly and rehashing the same stuff over and over again.
Hack your mind out of its sandbox.
The problem is that apparently you don't even have to implement something to get it patented. There was an article on slashdot a while back about Sony( I think) getting a patent on using radio waves or something to interface with the brain and create experiences for us sort of Matrix-style. They flat out said that they don't have the technology to do that, and don't expect to for quite some time, but they haven't been convinced that it's impossible.
Now I think that was more of a publicity stunt then an actual grab at useful intellectual property, but what's to keep someone less scrupulous from trying to predict the future a little and patent some of the ideas they come up with? There's all sorts of neat things with physics and AI that games will hopefully implement in the future, we just don't quite have the hardware to do it yet. But that doesn't mean I can't think of some of it, and pursue patents.
Sitting on an idea doesn't cost anything. I'd have to pay a lawyer to write out all the paperwork at the beginning, but a lawyer isn't going to be spending his time banging out code for me otherwise, so I'm not really slowing down my development either. This will turn out like every other industry seems to be. A few big players cross licensing everything so that they can keep working while cutting out the new guys; and some tiny IP only companies squatting on patents and then trying to screw the big names out of ridiculous amounts of money.
One time I threw a brick at a duck.
"Will this be the real end of innovation in videogames?"
The answer is: No, real innovation ended in videogames around the time doom2 hit the scene.
Shadus
Now we have yet another industry who's gene pool needs a lot of chlorine.
And for a cancer detection firm in Utah, it ahs paid off. They "patented" a gene sequence which tests for the likelihood of breast cancer (I think). Note that they didn't patent the test process, but the information in the gene. Now, no matter what process you use to determine the condition of the gene, you cannot use it for cancer detection wihtout paying a $10k fee to that company. They "own" the exclusive right to the "data". Sort of like patenting moon-dogs as a predictor of coming precipitation, or the presence of a high pressure as a predicter of clear weather. They're natural facts, observable by anyone with the proper instuments. But they're patentable now. (iirc, Canada got into trouble over the cancer detection thing).
**note: this is all from memory of a (single?) online news story quite some time ago, the facts may be significantly different that I have implied**
Is it just my observation, or are there way too many stupid people in the world?
Oh you mean EA's Madden Football.
-Dipster
Since when has a discovery been patentable subject matter?
Will this be the real end of innovation in videogames?"
I'm as much against patents as the next person here, but if people can't make new games that resemble existing games, that should surely encourage innovation. Each arcade game used to be radically different from the last in the eighties. Shoot-'em-ups already existed, so people started making games where you were a marble in a maze, or a plumber attacking turtles. These days the majority of games can be pigeonholed neatly into a category such as first person shooter (formerly called "Doom clones"), beat-'em-up, platformer and so on.
Maybe if people tried to make truly original and innovative games (although this would be better if they did it of their own free will rather than being forced to by patents), the industry would become as interesting as it once was.
The whole idea of experience points in the D&D/AD&D rule system already implemented such a system, so it can't be patented. Any game that has a game master has already given experience based on player actions above and beyond the normal pre-scripted stuff for the most part, so that would nullify the Microsoft patent since it was something in use prior to the patent application being filed.
The best way to tackle this is with a metaphor.
Video games are very similar to movies or books - they are siblings or cousins in the media family.
What if you could patent certain aspects of stories or movies?
The works of Shakespeare are, by and large, based on lesser plays, historical fictions or actual histories. He didn't invent most of his subject matter. He built on what he had.
All creative endeavor builds on existing ideas.
I am still a bit awestruck that people don't have the imagination to see where this kind of patent regime leads, but if we continue with it, we will get a very expensive education in how the creative process works, and we will finally begin to develop a rational understanding of "originality."
If we allow patents to expand their dominion into the arts, places incomprehensibly far afield of where the system was designed to go, we are doing nothing less than allowing layers to systematically destroy the creative process, by choking off its iterative nature.
It's astounding that I live in a world where this kind of thing can even be proposed by an apparently rational adult, let alone where such lunacy gets news coverage.
Tired of Political Trolls? Opt Out!
Spot on, especially with the force-feedback, camera control and such.
The problem is that the evolution of game development, like all software development, doesn't proceed in leaps -- big patentable breakthroughs, like a miracle drug. In industries progress consists of small improvements to the existing knowledge base, patents are demonstrably A Bad Thing -- not just bad for the poor little software developer guy (me), but for the state of that particular art. See MIT paper http://www.researchoninnovation.org/patent.pdf/
My turnips listen for the soft cry of your love
In my opinion video games are too complicated to patent, and to patent specific implementations of code I think is kind of stupid for a game. It's not what technology your game uses that sells your game, its whether or not the game is entertaining, which has very little to do with the the engineering implementation of your game.
Personally I think game devs and the GDC people would hate most patents simply because it stifles the sharing of ideas and knowledge to make better games because games are so time consuming to make already (3 years) like you want some idiot patenting specific implementations of math equations in a game engine and whatnot.
I really don't think you will see alot of patents in video game industry. Some companies make alot of money by selling off their game engines which is why you have clones. How many times has a game implemented the Unreal and Quake engines? While this is typically FPS, they are often the most played games aside from the sports genre.
string.Empty();
What is patentable is not copyrightable. At least so is written in Russian copyright&patent law, that conforms to international copyright&patent law AFAIK (except for DCMA of course).
It is not so clear about software itself, but thing that makes a game from a piece of software is closer to art than to technical invention in my opinion, i.e. it should stay copyrightable.
Just think, if that ape from "2001" had thought to patent "a method of killing opponents using a weapon", he'd now have all the bananas he could eat from EA and Activision ;-)
When I am king, you will be first against the wall.
it costs me a bomb in new graphics cards every year to be able to play the latest games the way they were meant to be seen.
This is just what we need to slow the out of control advancement of video game technology. Should save me a load of money.
Well, they patented playing a game during those really frickin slow load times anyway :). Too lazy to dig it up right now, but someone linked to it in the last discusion over European software patents.
Hi! I make Firefox Plug-ins. Check 'em out @ https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/youtube-mp3-podcaster/
The first example I heard about was David Braben and Ian Bell, who patented the 3D scanner on the game "Elite", back in 1984.
The problem is, it was really the only good way to do a 3D scanner that I've seen. As a result, every other 3D game that came out had a really crappy scanner.
GCHQ Quantum Insert installed. If only our tongues were made of glass, how much more careful we would be when we speak
that give the lawyers I know acid indigestion. Not all lawyers are unthinking and avaricious like this. Most of the ones I know are pretty good at long term thinking and believe in property protection the old fashioned way, through due diligence in protecting your own IP and going after the copiers as they get caught, not trying to stifle the industry/sector in advance, which is what this would do.
This is just stupid hucksterism.
If my grammar and spelling are off, I am [distracted/tired/careless] (take your pick)
With all crap that is happening on the web and in the world today. Where is a hacker when you need ? If any one is out there ?? Taking down that site would be a good place to start. Obviously this asshole either has no clue what he is talking about using terms like "Intellectual Property Protection" or he is trying to confuse people in believing he is trying to help. This type of "protection" will only ensure that the game cost go up and the quality go down. Thanks for trying to ruining another great thing. Michael
Linux: For those able to think out side of a window
To be clear though, style or flair, is simply *another* generally assigned "task" or series of "tasks". Each individual "trick" or the amount of air you get with a jump, or the amount of skid you get on a turn, is an optional "task" available to the player at all times.
From a programming perspective Microsoft has patented optional micro-tasks available to the player at any given time.
From a non-programming perspective, Microsoft has patented "style" -- an essential element to the sports of figure-skating, gymnastics, free-style skiing and dozens of other sports.
Microsoft is using nothing more than semantics to portray what they've done as something 'new'. If the goal of games is to mimic our real-world actions, we should be wary of allowing patents which incorporate new and more accurate reflections of reality.
------ The best brain training is now totally free : )
I could only imagine the horror if video game compaies were allowed to patent gameplay mechanisms. Wouldn't it be great if atari had been able apply for a patent on moving things on screen, or if Nintendo had got a patent on jumping in video games?
Oh, a lesson in history from Mr. I'm my own grandpa.
The video game industry is starting to get a little sterile (along with some of the other media industries). Proof of this exists exists in how many games are basically new skins layered onto existing engines and considering that at least half the time it happens the same company owns the rights to both the original game and the reskinned title no amount of patents will solve this problem.
Wow! That's news to me!
I don't like trolls and mod against me if you like, but I'd prefer if you'd reply.
Also, Atari has a patent on "ghost cars" in racing games. If you see a game with a ghost car they probably payed up for it's use.
The more the patent system is abused the sooner it will be changed. I'm waiting for the straw to break the camel's back.
JOhn
Campaign for Liberty
...and looks good on a Lawyer?
A rottweiller.
I am not merely a "consumer" or a "taxpayer". I am a Citizen of the State of Texas
The real issue here is the complete destruction of the home-grown game industry. Imagine if such things as sprites, or polygon representations of 3D objects had been patented. Then, to get the rights to use them, you would have to pay the fees. And of course, for the other game writers to use YOUR innovations, they have to pay your fees. It will get to the point where only the big countries with cross-patent licensing agreements will afford to be able to program the games. The little guys will simply NOT be able to afford the licenses to the technology they need to use. It's already halfway there right now. Boy, if only someone had patented the bubble sort.
Gee, a website with commentary about video games? Penny Arcade, right? Oh, "Patent Arcade"?
I'd send them a nasty letter for fun.
That's a good example... imagine how this would apply to say.. the medical industry.. no more robotic remote control or stuff because it would cost too much.. or your health bill goes up $5000 for the line item: Patent Fee on Software to save your life.
(1st sig) If this were a snappy sig, you'd be reading it right now. (2nd sig) I'm a karma whore. >Insert FUD here
Who'd use floating point? I always used fixed point and took advantage of the carry flag. Improves branch prediction accuracy as well.
If you ignore the other uses of a tool, does that make the tool less useful, or you less useful?
There, I said it. What's with all the anon coward BS? If you wanna call football players girls, do it right: GIIIIIRL!
l -players-obese_x.htm
I have to add that they're some mighty girls...
56% of football players are obese
26% are severely obese
3% are morbidly obese
http://www.usatoday.com/news/health/2005-03-01-nf
Now don't give me that "it's just BMI" crap. Have you seen the offensive and defensive tacklers on TV? Big fat fucks... that's an athlete? You've got to be kidding me. Next thing they're going to start introducing sumo wrestlers into the NFL.
Then look at tennis players. Sure, they get injured a lot (from overplaying), but each is as fit as you get... The top couple hundred players in the world are perfect examples of what an athlete should be.
"If you could only see what I've seen with your eyes..." - Roy Batty
the real end of innovation in videogames?"
Of course not! Didn't you know? Patents and copyrights promote innovation. I theeenk. Isn't that the way it works? C'mon all you IP guys...show some support. All this patenting and copyrighting is bound to give us our supersonic mag-lev pods, the end of poverty and hunger, and world peace any time now.
What?
rdannenberg@bannerwitcoff.com
Let them know just what you think of their patent ideas.
.sigs are for post^Hers.
Does anyone find it funny that they're using an Open Source CMS to promote VG patents?
Will this be the real end of innovation in videogames?
No, that happened a long time ago. I can't remember the last innovative video game I've seen. Probably SimCity (the original one).
...shooter years ago then we might actually see some innovations in games today. As it is all we see is Yet Another Remake of the First Person Shooter.
I thought I read somewhere (in an article on Patents - i Think it was New Yorker), where someone suggested that the possibility of professional athletic teams patenting certain PLAYS!! GIVE ME A FREAKING BREAK!!! That's when you have far too many people with FAR too much money on their hands.
They're all going to be up against the wall when the revolution comes.
The revolution will come, and it will not be televised - attributed to Gil Scott Heron.
Next thing you know, someone will patent H20 or DMSO. It's going to take a really ridiculous one to really make people stand up and notice. Or how about recipes - those are instructions on how to make something. Why shouldn't they be protected to? Well, some are protected by copyright but I think you get the gist.
I think this is why the EU struggles mightily with IP laws. They've seen what a stinking cesspool the U.S. Patent and Trade Office has become all at the behest of greedy corporations and their slimey attorneys.
They're very late.
There's already pending litigation against Roxor Games by Konami for violating registered IP concerning the Dance Dance Revolution series of games.
Non impediti ratione cogitationus.
While I oppose patents on business methods, software and algorithm, I think I am in favor for such a case as video games patent. What better mean to force some diversity in the gameplay at last ? It would be a form of copyright, a form of author's rights, the same that enable novels and movies to have passably differing scripts and stories and not copy on each other. Enabling incremental technical improvements, which is the main reason to oppose other forms of patents, doesn't seem as important in this case.
Too bad ID Software didn't patent the First Person Shooter. Software companies would have been forced to create new innovative types of games instead of flooding the market with FPSs for the past decade.
Havoc Video
Patents for video game concepts might be a good thing. IMHO, fat plumbers and bullet-time should never meet. The problem lies in developers trying to "blanket patent" a concept that is great for gaming as a whole. Imagine an internet geek trying to patent/trademark "use of acronyms to condense common phrases"...LOL(tm) PS - "blanket patent" is a trademark.
Yes, this is true. For more information (from the trouble Canada got into over this) see this site: http://www.cancer.ca/ccs/internet/standard/0,3182, 3172_61901275__langId-en,00.html
Yay for patents! Now that your health is dependent on licensing a patent, I think it's time for a social revolution.
Perhaps I will try to get a DNA sample from the CEO of that Utah company, and file for a patent on his specific gene sequence. If he can patent a gene sequence that has existed for 2 million years, then I should be able to patent one that has existed for less than 100...
Wouldn't it be funny to sue him for existing? "Hey, you're existence infringes on my patent! Either pay up or change your DNA!". :-)
Why doesn't someone just patent podcasting and be done with the whole industry?? Oh dont say that out loud, for the love of god.
Butthead Vendor
I'm not a huge USA football fan, but allow me to retort.
Athleticism is rather subjective outside the context of particular sports. You'd be hard-pressed to find a tennis player with the strength of a below average NFL player . . . even on a pound-per-pound basis. I also think you'd be absolutely stunned to see how fast some of those big fat boys really are. Your obesity metrics are absurd in the context of a sport where size and strength are of major importance.
If you want to talk about athletes, consider a top-notch NFL linebacker. I doubt that you could find the equivalent combination of strength, speed and agility in any other sport.
...of how patents affect games in development.
:(
A racing game, which sold quite well, had a fully working play-tested "ghost car" time-trial game mode (where your best lap is saved, and a see-through version of your car can be watched driving it from then on, until you beat it, and so on).
This ghost car system, it turns out, is patented by Atari, and at the time they wanted a huge pot-o-cash, far more than the developer could really afford (or wished to pay, frankly), so the ghost car got removed. The time trial mode stayed, but was for me at least less fun than it had been.
That is despite the patents never mentioning a computer game, but a "driver training system". The patents in question (US at least) are 5,269,687, 5,354,202 and 5,577,913. Atari may well have invented it, but that isn't my point. The point is that it is an extremely simple to implement *fun* addition to a game, and the possible validity of the patent means that games are either less fun, or cost more if you license the patents which *might* apply to them. Bah, where did all the fun go?
Game dev and music blog
if they patented the gene sequence, couldn't someone argue that it is not patentable since its a natural phenomena (that the sequence occurs).
i ndex.html#whatpat
at least that is what I'm getting from reading from the uspto site at...
http://www.uspto.gov/web/offices/pac/doc/general/
This is our destiny. You don't know the power of the patent law.
Seriously, those farks look like people who really wish to take a shit, and are looking for the first good place they can find for that purpose. No, really, why the hell every good thing in the programming industry must be spoiled by stupid, idiotic, short-sighted lawyers? Why? Why the ****er do we need those trolls? Why the hell are they always getting in the way, trying to piss on everything that is good and worthy?
Well, I guess I just need to "let go of things", right?
When a patent fight turns into an actual courtroom battle, there is often real money to be made by the programmers behind the original titles.
An expert witness fee can rival a lawyers hourly rate.
I have already been involved in one lawsuit where I made more from testifying about an invention being "prior art" than I did coding it up in the first place.
Of course, by the time things get to this point, the war is already underway - creating a great risk to the challenger. Most of the time a pay-off makes more business sense.
In whatever area Microsoft rests their gaze, and dominates, rapid innovation in functionality stops.
Examples:
o Office. Once WP was knocked down, MS has only done only small updates to Office.
o OS. Since the big WFW 3.11 to W95 jump, they added the '95 GUI to NT and did the Luna interface, but generally the same kernel/filesystem for a decade now.
o Browsers. Once Netscape was nocked down, IE5 was updated to 6 after a big wait and then nothing now until Firefox has started to threaten.
o Personal finance. Stalemate between Money and Quicken, and not much has changed for years.
o etc.
Gaming is an area they are not dominating in (yet), and so they have to work their butts off. But, if they start dominating (from either a legal or other position), the same thing will happen here as in other areas. This also applies to Google and the net.
Always has.
Don't steal. The government hates competition.
The Patent Office is on a spree, trivia like prior art or significant (i.e., perceptible) innovation no longer apply. Now's your chance to patent the bra, you can go around fining women for violating your patent unless they remove it immediately.
I think I'll get me a patent on this piece of code.
while(corporation.worth > citizens.worth) { lawyers.power = citizens.power; }
Let's patent the method by which Patent Lawyers become Patent Lawyers. That way, any school will be forced to stop teaching Patent Law. Then we can get rid of all these blood suckers and make them work at McDonald's.
Still waiting on Serviscope_minor to wake up to fucking reality and realize that Jessica Price isn't going to fuck him.
Scoring based upon goals achieved and subjective elements.
I claim prior art! I've been doing this when awarding RPG experience points to players since 1980!
Don't blame me, I didn't vote for either of them!
So, who cares. The patent system (in the US, coming to Europe shortly) is laughable, and those in power are too busy with themselves to even think with a bit of common sense. I mean, why? WTF? Are they that out of touch with reality? What's wrong with those people, one might think that if they were clever enough to come to power they would at least try not to look like total retards when they pass new laws, right?
When I buy a game, do I buy it because it has a more advanced AI than another? Do I buy it because it has "Virtual 3D Camera Shake Technology(tm)!!1"? No. I buy it for the content. I want a Star Wars game, I want Shrek game.
The gaming industry is in the entertainment business. Their actual competitors (besides each other) are 1 - the movie industry and 2 - the music industry. Games are about their content, their technology is pretty much a nicety. Granted, there is some cool technology in games in terms of rendering engines and AI's, but it's still the game itself - the content - that sells it. Content is protected by copyright laws.
Imagine if id patented the FPS style of game, or Westwood patented the RTS (actually, it would have been technosoft with Herzog Zwei back in the '80s). We would have a smaller chance of having a "Half Life", or a "Total Annihilation" due to the patent process.
No doubt, the lawyers involved here are simply trying to pad their own pockets, and don't really care about the industry.
Fortunately, I think the gaming industry knows itself better than these lawyers do.
I remember around the time that Virtua Racing hit the arcades I heard a lot of patent talk relating to Sega. Essentially, they claimed a patent on what was tantamount to rendering polygons.
I just a cursory 1/2 second search, I found a reference to Yu Suzuki (legendary programmer) having obtained a patent on switching views in a 3D racing game. That was directly tied to Virtua Racing. The patent number was allegedly #2687989 though I don't know in what patent office that was. Perhaps Japan.
Additionally, you may want to look at:
http://gauss.ffii.org/PatentView/EP1033682
http://gauss.ffii.org/PatentView/EP981107
Apparently in Europe Sega owns the method and the idea of using 3 dimensional calculations to render an object in 2 dimensions on a screen, heh.
Video game patents are old news, though I'm not sure if any of them actually stick. I'm sure there is bound to be a case of "Prior Art" for virtually every patent.
Brings kids back to traditional values of sex, drugs, and RnR, experienced live.
Improves US and European balance of payments by eliminating shiploads of Chinese electronics imports.
Transfers vast sums of cash from a productivity-killing industry into the pockets of attorneys, who might just invest in something worthwhile.... whoa, that's a bit too much BS even for me!
Newly worthless consoles and portable gaming systems sell for pennies on the dollar, providing me a vast stock of future LCD picture frames and Beowulf nodes.
Luke, help me take this mask off
I'm going to patent 'the massacre of patent lawyers after coming off a carnage high from playing an FPS'. And after that I'm going to make a game where the objective is to slaughter as many patent lawyers ass possible, then patent it.
OK, what if this isn't the end of innovation, but actually the end of clone games?
One of the things mentioned in the article a couple days ago about all the things wrong with video games these days, was clone games.
How many freaking World War 2 games must there be? How many first person shooters in general? GTA clones? Golf, football, hockey clones?
If people were legally blogged from using other people's ideas to create a clone game, sure a lot of the fluff would drop out of the industry, but maybe the few companies still going would be pumping out really innovative ideas - so they could pattent them and make more money!
no comment
this will lead to someone patenting something totally obvious and bring main stream attention to this business of software patents, and hopfully end it.
If you mod me down, I will become more powerful than you can imagine....
the lawyer factories, and a lot of dipshit investors or CEO who are way off base when it comes to their forgetting that, inevitably, most human-made things are based upon or inspired by many other things singly and in combination.
Trying to patent a football game is tenuous. Unless there is a patent on football, or on a "Hail Mary" move, the game itself is nothing more than a revenue conduit. I guess in time well have the "Football Royalty" police cracking down on neighborhood kids playin in an alleyway, on a park, or on the beach. Won't matter that they are not in a soccer stadium with sponsors and attendees...
It seems that Patent Protection to the exclusion of others improving upon or making an end-run around a lame or half-baked product is at best Patent Insanity.
Previously: "Linux... Toward the Sunrise..." Now: "Linux... Toward the-- No, now, part of Every Sunrise"
This is not only a gross over-simplification, it's flat-out wrong. The "in-order processing" done by the PowerPC CPUs in the Xbox 360 and the Cell processor in the PS3 is simply that -- machine instructions are executed in the order that they are presented to the CPU. In other words, these processors don't do instruction reordering. What does this have to do with AI? Absolutely nothing, really. Sure, instruction reordering would probably improve the performance of unoptimized code -- but good compiler tools will do the instruction reordering at compile time and save the transistors on the chip for more useful things.
When I see drivel like this, I tend to tune out the rest of the message, because it's clear the messenger doesn't know what he's talking about.
Having said that, the author of this manifesto probably has a valid point about the patent issues, though. I would have liked some more citations to back up these claims. Just because someone says these things are true doesn't mean they are. Lots of misinformation gets repeated ad nauseum until people believe it's true, when it really isn't. (Remember the old chestnut about video game consoles being sold at a loss? The truth is, few consoles have been sold at a loss. Of the few that started out being sold at a loss, most became profitable as the economics of mass production came into play. I believe the Xbox is the only current-generation console that's still losing money. The last PS2 redesign made Sony's system ultra-cheap to produce.)
Oh, here's another gem from this "manifesto":Ah, yes, load times in PC games are only the result of copy protection! How silly of me to think that it should actually take time for a non-trivial amount of data to be moved from a hard disk into system memory... I mean, seriously, this manifesto was written by someone with near-zero understanding of how hardware actually works, how computers work.
Cripes, I need a toothbrush for my eyeballs...
I'm going to go out on a limb and say that this could be a good thing. Games simply aren't innovative these days anyway. Sure, it'd suck if ID held the patent for first person shooters and Tecmo held the patent for simple fighters and Rockstar held patents for nonlinear urban games and driving simulations and SOA held the patent for MMOs ...
BUT
We'd have to think of something else.
Think about it. I enjoy a good FPS as much as the next guy, but we only see one truly innovative game every year or two (think Katamari Damacy), and it comes off as mediocre at best.
What if we put the same resources into character and AI design that we do into graphics? Personally, I'd be fine if, ten years from now, Half-Life 3 came out with only slightly smoother (but not mind-boggling) graphics, but I could actually interact with Alyx. (Hell, I'd be happy if I could do a two-player campaign where a friend plays Alyx.) Remember what was promised for HL2 -- comments like "Oh, do be careful!" and "Quit staring at me" and monsters that had more than just one or two scripted moves.
Don't thank God, thank a doctor!
I'm proud that there is "a relative dearth of patent applications for the video game industry, especially considering how technology-dependent the video game industry is, and given its size in terms of annual sales."
Before issuing a condemnation, I try hard to think about it from their point of view -- the laws of the land set the rules of the game, and lawyers are deeply confused at why some of us aren't using all the tools that the game gives us.
Patents are usually discussed in the context of someone "stealing" an idea from the long suffering lone inventor that devoted his life to creating this one brilliant idea, blah blah blah.
But in the majority of cases in software, patents effect independent invention. Get a dozen sharp programmers together, give them all a hard problem to work on, and a bunch of them will come up with solutions that would probably be patentable, and be similar enough that the first programmer to file the patent could sue the others for patent infringement.
Why should society reward that? What benefit does it bring? It doesn't help bring more, better, or cheaper products to market. Those all come from competition, not arbitrary monopolies. The programmer that filed the patent didn't work any harder because a patent might be available, solving the problem was his job and he had to do it anyway. Getting a patent is uncorrelated to any positive attributes, and just serves to allow either money or wasted effort to be extorted from generally unsuspecting and innocent people or companies.
Yes, it is a legal tool that may help you against your competitors, but I'll have no part of it. Its basically mugging someone.
I could waste hours going on about this. I really need to just write a position paper some day that I can cut and paste when this topic comes up.
John Carmack
Wait, no, that's not it. I meant to say "I am Patenting Fun!"
Why not?
To paraphrase every post on slashdot regarding patents: That's where these laws are going... they no longer serve their original purpose, etc. etc.
and then I'm supposed to link to "whatiscopyright.org" and watch my post get "+5 awesome"!
i've just patented "an irritating little man that you pay to fight dirty in the so-called 'justice' system". think i'll call it a lawyer.
Anyone thought of any good acronyms L.A.W.Y.E.R. could stand for?
No, I will not license the patent out.
Public companies can be hostilely taken over. Private companies are less likely to be allowed to develop on consoles.
Slow Down Cowboy! Slashdot requires you to wait 2 minutes between each successful posting of a comment to allow everyone a fair chance at posting a comment. It's been 13 minutes since you last successfully posted a comment
The expression of the software is copyrightable. The method by which the software works is patentable. But you can't patent the expression
Industrial designs are expressive yet can be patented in many cases. For instance, Apple has a patent on the shape of Mac OS X's trash can icon and on the screen layout of the iTunes user interface.
Seriously.. I don't know the answer, can someone answer?